From the Cold and Frost
by Niki Chidon
Summary: Sequel to A More Perfect Union and The Age of Fire and Gravel. The next treasure... though, to be fair, it's really a part of the previous one. Ben/Ian, Riley/OFC
1. Many Runes the Cold Has Told Me

Notes: _Book of Secrets_ didn't happen. Reading at least _Fire and Gravel_ before this recommended.

Thanks to Sila for yet more Dutchisms! Source reading at the end of the last chapter. Thanks to Mr Niki (he chose his name;) for random historical data. Oh, and to my mom for the suggestion for the location of the treasure.

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From the Cold and Frost aka Legends of the Times Forgotten

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_Shall I bring these songs together_

_From the cold and frost collect them?_

From _The Kalevala_, translated by John Martin Crawford, 1887

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Part 1: Mina; "Many Runes the Cold Has Told Me"

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Depending on how you define things, people have been living, dying and getting born in Antarctica for a couple of centuries. Some even get married here, even though the legality of such ceremonies is often in question due to the international nature of the continent.

We still don't know how long the city structure we call Atlantis has been here, or how long ago it was abandoned – but we do know its history spans thousands of years. How long ago was the last bonding ceremony of any sort held within these walls?

Before ours, that is. It's not legal, and it doesn't need to be. I'm not a member of any church, and religion means little to Riley. We can take care of the government's side of it later; we just wanted to exchange our vows here, in this place that is to be our home for a long time.

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It took time to sort out everything after the night Anne crossed the line from obsession to insanity. Patrick needed immediate medical attention, and was first treated by our team doctor, then the closest science station – which happened to be American – offered help and their medical team performed an emergency operation which enabled him to survive the trip home. We invited the doctors to our wedding.

Ian and his men stayed behind to protect our site, while Ben worked from the base camp to arrange a more permanent research post. Abigail and later Patrick took care of things in the States, and Ben's contacts all over the world made sure everything went smoother than I could ever have believed.

I wrote the first press releases. We kept the whole incident with guns silent, and I mentioned Anne as part of the group responsible for locating the lost city. None of us wanted to strip her of that, despite everything. She is officially out of the project for medical reasons. Well, that's not really a lie, except that I didn't actually spell out that she's in the Psychiatrisch Ziekenhuis Veldwijk – a mental institution back in the Netherlands.

We assembled a perfect team to work in our lost city. Thankfully, I don't have to lead it. Ben found a perfect leader for the project in an older professor who is more used to dealing with the politics of an operation this size than me. I am technically just a part of the team but everyone knows this is _my_ project, my baby. I have my say in every decision, I'm the first to learn about any new find.

We have experts on every field one could dream of, and I genuinely like all of these people – you have to, working in these surroundings. Some of us sleep in the buildings we built next to the mountain, some in Atlantis itself. Needless to mention, I – we – live here.

That's what you want to hear about, isn't it? Riley and me, how we are doing?

Just fine, thank you very much. I love him to bits. I don't think any one of us would survive sane here without his irreverent humour. He's wonderful – I was worried about how he'd feel about living in the 'Frozen Wonderland Behind God's Back' as he so eloquently refers to the land but when ever I ask he just shrugs, gives me that smile – you know the one I mean – and says that as long as he has his Internet access and me he'll make do. Not necessarily in that order.

He is invaluable, really, doing whatever is needed. Cataloguing, solving any computer problems we have – and in these conditions you have plenty – and even holding a flashlight to a squealing linguist on occasion. He also makes sure I eat and sleep, and not just spend my days staring at the walls.

We do manage to have quite a lot of sex, too. Hey, it's our honeymoon, after all. Yes, I'm grinning widely writing that.

We make new discoveries every day. The first one that took my breath away as much as the first glimpse of the place is a room – or a set of rooms... wait, I'll need to explain a bit. We have discovered many connected sets of rooms we have taken to calling apartments. They don't always resemble living spaces but are somehow a coherent whole in this beehive of a mountain where everything is interconnected.

So, in our systematic research of the place we stumbled into this 'apartment' we dubbed the Story Room. The walls are filled with carvings and paintings like everywhere but these are different. Every room tells a story. The text we still can't translate but the pictures are clear enough. And even Riley can recognise the myth, though for us it is more familiar in a Greek context. It's about spring, and families, and love, and about the king of the underworld kidnapping a queen for himself. Hades and Persephone. Pluto and Proserpina. Oh... my... Go...

"Well, we knew they sailed around the world," Riley pointed out and I wanted to hit him. Being reasonable when I was speechless?

"Yeah, but this is... it's... the first proof we have of... the influence..." I swallowed, hugging him, hugging the others who had been assigned to our team along that corridor.

I remember whispering, reverently "The Kings of Atlantis Become the Gods of the Greeks" while staring at the wall.

Riley didn't even need to ask this time. He is used to me quoting Ignatius Donnelly by now.

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It took us six months to stumble into our first Atlanteans.

We have a system. We establish research in the rooms we have gone through before venturing forth to find more. That's why we only advance a few rooms a day. Everything needs to be catalogued and photographed before moving on. We only make that much progress because we have so many people to do this.

We divide into smaller teams and everyone takes turns in 'exploring duty' as well as 'cataloguing duty'. Yes, Riley's terms. As is the whole concept of 'venturing worth', I might add.

I try to do my exploring with Riley, not only because otherwise we spend way too little time together but also because it truly is a joy. I never know how he is going to react to things, or what he is going to say.

I wouldn't have expected his reaction to finding a room filled with human remains to be what it was.

"Huh, bodies," was all he said, seeing the piles of mummified remains.

I have to admit I was a bit surprised he wasn't more troubled.

"You handled that well."

"Well, hanging around you academicians has certain... what's the opposite of 'a perk'?"

I honestly don't remember whether I kicked him or kissed him. I seem to do a lot of both.

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I'll have to stop writing soon. I'm getting tired. I seem to be getting tired a lot easier these days. Maybe it's because I seem to forget to go out in the sun most days. Or the fact that I'd forget to eat if Riley didn't bug me. Healthy foods too. Who'd have thought?

Or maybe it's all that sex that's cutting into my sleeping hours.

Yeah. I'm – we're – happy. Pretty darn happy. The only thing that frustrates me no end is the fact that we still can't make head or tails of the language. My dream, and I can't crack it. Where's my Rosetta stone, dammit? I had hoped the shared myths would help but no. All this history, the wealth of information... and like the Etruscan language, we can't read it. It's killing me, and I just want to go through more rooms, unwilling to wait, unable to believe we wouldn't find anything that could help. Just like Riley said, they _did_ sail the world. They made the map. They made the disk.

Didn't they bring _anything_ back? Didn't they learn any languages? Or were they really all gone before other written languages emerged?

Well, at least we know the Nazis didn't empty Atlantis, after all. With the size of this place that would have taken decades. It took us months to reach parts they left untouched, though, and still we haven't found much.

We have come to the conclusion that the lower we get, the farther back in time we go. I am willing to buy the theory that the city started on the ground level and every time they needed more room the Atlanteans built – dug – upwards. They kept abandoning the older, lower, levels and took their belongings with them. We have a working theory that there have been windows and even rooms outside the mountain as well but these have been destroyed by the snow and ice.

So the part we entered was probably the newest, or latest, part of the city, and therefore rich in artefacts. I can but hope Ian and Ben are successful in locating them.

- - - - End of part 1. - - - - -


	2. Songs Preserved from Distant Ages

Warning: This chapter handles some adult issues concerning the Nazis and homosexuality. Nothing graphic but I thought it fair to warn you nonetheless.

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Part 2: Ben; "Songs Preserved from Distant Ages"

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In all the articles written about me, my family, and our quest for the Templar treasure the last weeks of the search got the most attention. The action, the drama (even though most of it was hushed up, of course), the excitement. What almost everyone left out were the years of paperwork, the hours spent in musty archives and libraries doing research. Not exciting enough.

I like it. I like the action, yeah, but I get as much pleasure from discovering the next clue in a musty old newspaper as I would – did – from finding hidden inventions in famous buildings.

So this is nothing new to me, the hours we spend in archives and libraries and discussions with scholars. Of course, this time the material is in German, which adds the further problem of needing a translator. Ian speaks some German which helps, and even I can spot familiar place names and important names but it's not enough.

We called Abigail in to help. She was born here and even though her family moved to the States when she was just two, she is bilingual. And she thrives on research, telling us first thing that she'll leave the actual diving for us. Me and Ian, that is.

It could be awkward, this. I mean, we have worked with Abigail for more than a year now but... there have always been others around. Now it's just me, Ian and Abigail and we need to... talk.

I'm so looking forward to that.

But back to the research. What we have discovered so far is that there's nothing to discover. When the bulk of Ahnenerbe's papers were discovered in a cave near the village of Pottenstein in Bavaria, there was nothing, absolutely no mention of the expedition in the South despite having detailed descriptions of their other expeditions to many exotic locations as well as the medical tests the Ahnenerbe scientists had performed on the concentration camp prisoners, including the infamous Jewish skeleton collection. So either the Atlantis papers were part of the material that was destroyed or... or then someone was playing into their own purses and the information was never shared with the main office.

Atlantis... that's huge. You'd think _something_ would have surfaced after the war? Could of course be that they destroyed the evidence and kept quiet because Mina and her team have recovered evidence that the Atlanteans might have been black. That wouldn't fit well into Heinrich Himmler's insistence that the Aryans created civilisation.

Are the artefacts destroyed? Why go through all that trouble of getting the stuff out of the place if they were just going to destroy them?

And how did the Nazis find the city in the first place? Did they, too, have a map? So many questions, so little clues that I would be ready to believe we have imagined the whole thing but for two solid facts: Atlantis _does_ exist, and the Nazis _did_ go there. So why isn't there a single mention of an expedition in the Antarctic area?

We have exhausted most of our leads. We tried following Anne's grandfather's career, hoping to get some clues about the expedition through his service years. The information we have discovered is patchy at best but it does suggest that the excursion took place in the last years of the war when Ahnenerbe was already so big it could have been possible to have secrets within the organisation, maybe even from Himmler himself.

The other avenue, the lake itself, is even more difficult because even though it is not that big it is very deep, and diving in blind would be like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Well, you never know. Abigail knows someone who knows someone who might have heard something about someone who... you get the point. We're on our way to meet a Mrs Schreiber whose son was working on something that might interest us before his death some decades ago.

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"Frau Schreiber, thank you for talking to us," Abigail says and introduces us. She is speaking in English, having explained to us that our hostess understands the language well enough, only refuses to speak it herself.

"Setzen Sie, bitte," the old lady says, more of a command than a request, and we sit down, me and Ian on a sofa and Abigail on a chair next to Mrs Schreiber's armchair.

She is in her eighties, a handsome woman who sits straight in her chair – like she has been taught to sit with a book on top of her head and has never forgotten the lessons.

She starts talking and Abigail translates. Apparently, her son, Dietfried, was a journalist, looking into the mystery of the lake Toplitz. Because he did his research in the sixties he was actually able to locate eyewitnesses, and even a soldier who allegedly was a part of the party that dumped the crates into the lake.

And at that bombshells she shuts up. I feel like yelling out of pure frustration but Ian touches my arm in calming manner. Abigail's eyes are filled with compassion when she asks our hostess about what happened to her son.

She is obviously unwilling to tell us but then she notices Ian's hand on my arm and smiles for the first time since we came.

"You are together?" she asks in English, and I am surprised about her perceptiveness. We're not that obvious, we can't afford to be. Not even in Europe, even though Ian keeps telling me it's different here.

Ian lets his hand slide down until he's covering my hand with his.

"Yes," he replies simply.

"I wish happiness to you, from my heart." She is quiet for a moment, then starts talking, quietly, in her lightly accented English.

"Before the war we lived in Berlin, my parents, me, and my brother. He was twenty, and handsome, and happy, and he had a lover. My parents did not know but I did, and I was glad for him. Even though we are German, when they start taking the Jews away they also take him away, take both of them away. Later I learn his lover died in the camp but he lived. Then the war was over and the British and the Americans were freeing the Jews. But no one freed the Homosexuals. They are still criminals. They go to prison for their... crimes. Their years in the camp are not even counted in their sentences."

She pauses and I think she's about to cry but she doesn't. Maybe she has no tears left, but I find I have to blink quite rapidly. Abigail is crying quietly.

"The laws change in the 60's. My brother comes out of prison, and Dietfried does not want to write about anything but how his uncle has been treated. They die in a car accident three months later."

I look at this frail, proud old woman with her dry eyes and feel like a bastard for still wanting to know about his son's research. And to my amazement she smiles again.

"It is better now. The law is just now, and even people change. They mention them now, the forgotten ones. They have monuments. People like him, like you, can walk in the street and hold hands, just like me and my husband. You want to go treasure hunting? You can have Diet's papers. I saved all of them."

"Danke schön, Frau Schreiber, vielen Dank," I get out.

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"Damn, what a story," I say outside her door.

I can't help put pull Ian into a hug as soon as we have left the building.

"I feel so ashamed for having it so easy. I don't have to fear dying because I love you," I mutter against his hair.

"When we get back to Berlin," Abigail says decisively, "we are going to go visit one of the monuments she mentioned. I feel like... paying my respects."

"You get no refusal from us," Ian replies for both of us.

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Dietfried Schreiber's research is a goldmine. Abigail translates his complete notes on an interview of a young soldier who was loading the boxes that were later dumped into the lake. And then we get our clue: the boxes were not just dumped, they were hidden in a _cave_ that had been formed in the torpedo tests. He doesn't provide coordinates or anything as easy as that but his descriptions should aid us in locating the cave.

We can find them. We can actually find them.

"So, we tell Riley and Mina now or when we have the boxes?" I ask, leaning back on the office chair we purchased for the hotel room to make working easier during our stay.

Ian gets up from his seat to come stand next to my chair. His grin is teasing and sexy as hell.

"Pretty sure of yourself, aren't you? How did Riley put it? Just because you got lucky twice doesn't mean you'll strike gold every time you dig."

"I got lucky alright," I reply, with a grin of my own, and pull his head down for a kiss. Before our lips meet I remember Abigail is still in the room.

I turn to look at her and she smiles slightly.

"I think that's my cue to leave," she says, and walks to the door.

As soon as the door has closed behind her I take that kiss, and we remove ourselves into the bedroom to celebrate.

I never get tired of this, him. Kissing him, burying my hands in his hair (he's kept it short ever since he came out of the prison), arching my neck when he bites me just low enough for the t-shirt to cover the mark, running my fingers down his back, tracing the old scars, touching and kissing and licking every part of him I can reach and then some.

I enjoy the feel of his skin, his muscles, the strength that meets mine. The knowledge I can't hurt him or break him no matter how hard we play, how desperate I get, how hasty we are. We can do gentle, we can do rough, we can do everything in between; we can do dirty, we can do considerate, and damn it, every time _still_ feels better than ever before. I think I must be in love.

It's very mutual.

Afterwards, Ian holds me close, running his fingers lazily on my skin. This, too, is normal. The moments of tenderness we are not ashamed of.

"It would be worth it," he says quietly.

"Huh?" I am torn out of my musings by his serious tone.

"This. Even if we had to die for it."

This from a man who waited over four decades to get the words 'I love you' out of his mouth. Damn, he never stops taking my breath away.

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We meet Abigail for breakfast. She seems to have spent a sleepless night.

"I have been... thinking," she says quietly, staring at her cup of coffee, and I meet Ian's gaze briefly. Is this the talk I've been dreading?

"About?" I encourage her.

"You and Ian, me and you," she replies and meets my eyes.

"Ah." I don't really know what to say.

"Should I... leave you to it?" Ian asks.

"No, don't. I..." Abigail seems to be searching for the right words, then takes a deep breath. "I hated you for so long," she admits, looking at Ian.

"I didn't hate you when you were threatening us, or when you chased us. I feared you. But when I realised Ben felt... more for you than he did for me, I..."

"I didn't know," I say. She was so... reasonable when she told me to go to Ian.

"I had time to make my peace with it before you... before we... I was... resigned. I knew I had to learn to tolerate him if I didn't want to lose you. I don't love you anymore, I don't want you back, it's not that. But I have always _liked_ you more than loved, and I valued your friendship. I still do. But..." She smiles to Ian, now.

"I learned to genuinely like you too. You're good to Ben, and you are... a good man, despite everything that has happened."

"Thank you," Ian says quietly.

"What I'm trying to say is... I've been... holding back. I've just been polite but now I... Can we be friends? You don't need to hide what you have from me, I won't start crying if you kiss in front of me, and I promise not to... make you feel uncomfortable. It was easier to act like nothing had happened when the whole group was around but now... I have to deal with the break up. And I have to deal with the reality that is you two."

"We never wanted to rub your face in it."

"I know, and I'm grateful. But I shouldn't have made you feel like you need to hide. I don't want to forget what we had. But I'm over it. Friends?" she asks, offering me her right hand.

"Friends," I say, and take her hand.

She offers her left hand to Ian.

"Friends," he also says.

"Now... How about we blow this joint and go to Austria?"

I respond to her suggestion with a grin and lean in to kiss her cheek. Ian follows my example.

"Austria it is."

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Hidden in the Austrian Alps and shadowed by a dense forest the Toplitzsee was almost inaccessible in 1945. These days there's a perfectly serviceable road but that doesn't solve all of the problems. Without my reputation we wouldn't have even been granted a permission to research the lake. So many have tried and died that the government does not let anyone dive these days – but who could say no to a man who found the fabled Templar treasure _and_ Atlantis? I have to say, after the decades of ridicule my family has suffered, I quite enjoy the benefits of fame.

Stories of what the Nazis did here and what they hid here, and even what has been found, differ greatly. What we have been able to confirm is that they did test explosives and torpedoes here in the beginning of the war, and remains of those tests have been found. They also dumped counterfeit money here, a leftover from a plot to destroy the economy of their enemies. The bills were in wooden crates that have since disintegrated in the water. There have always been rumours of gold and treasure hidden here but no one has ever found any traces of that.

Dietfried's source maintains that the boxes they delivered here in 1945 were metal, and as such contained something that was meant to survive the storage underwater. It makes sense that they would not have been dumped into the depths because with the technology of the day they would have been impossible to retrieve. That's why I believe in the cave story.

Dietfried's SS man didn't think they hid gold, or stolen property from the prisoners. He claimed he had been transporting something from one of the Ahnenerbe buildings but without Himmler's say-so. His colonel was working on his own. Does that mean we've found one of our conspirators?

Would SS-Standartenführer Wolff Hegewald really have been able to hide an operation the size of an expedition to Antarctica from the head of the SS, especially in the last years of the war when the army was lacking in resources and men? Sounds incredible, I admit. Would he have been able to disguise it as something else? But the manpower, the scientists... the logistics, the ships... the more I think about it the more incredible it sounds.

When discussing this with Ian he points out that we shouldn't have been able to find Atlantis in the first place, with what we had to work on. And had _we_ perished in our quest, no outsider would have known our true goal. He has a point.

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Getting the needed equipment to the lake was difficult because it is so high in the mountains – dead mountains, they call them. The lake is also 'dead', devoid of almost all life after the first 20 metres because of the lack of oxygen below that. The surroundings look beautiful but I'm in no hurry to dive into the water. I couldn't even tell you why I feel like that, I'm not superstitious as a rule.

It's a bright June morning when I don my diving gear for the first time in years. We have spent a week doing calculations and scouting by the lake before risking going down, and I've used the time to test the equipment and my skills. I'm well aware that entering a cave in the canyon wall I risk stumbling to unexploded material. I'd much rather do this on my own but only fools dive alone. Ian is a fairly good recreational diver, and some of his men are also licensed, and can act as our back up on ground. I'm not happy risking anyone else, especially Ian, and Ian is not happy about risking me but we both understand the requirements of the trade. Besides, I was trained to do this.

There are not many of us; me and Ian, Abigail, a few of Ian's men, and some technicians I've known for years. We'll be going in with a waterproof camera that provides instant picture to the team on the shore. We also invested on the latest gear so that we can communicate underwater with Ian, as well as with the team.

The conditions are hardly ideal for diving. The water is murky, and I can barely see where I'm going despite the bright light of my headgear. I find the canyon wall, and follow it down, seeing here and there holes made by torpedoes, all of them too small for our purposes. If the boxes required many men to lift one, they'd have to be big.

Resisting temptation to move sideways I follow the search pattern we set up, for the first time happy I'm not alone down here.

"Ian?" I say even before I have time to think about it.

His reply is instantaneous in my earplugs. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I just... damn creepy down here," I say sheepishly, and can hear the laughter in his reply.

"I'll say. Glad I'm not here alone."

"I'm willing to concede the fact... hey, I think I found something. I can't see... yes, definitely a larger hole than the previous ones. Can you see it?"

"Yes. Worth checking, I suppose," Ian says.

"We can see it too," Abigail tells us.

"I'm going in," I say, following the safety guidelines we drew – one goes in, one stays outside the cave, connected with a rope. If the audio link fails, we can always communicate the old fashioned way with tugs on the rope.

"Be careful," Ian says.

"Always."

I swim in carefully, having just enough room to manoeuvre with the camera. I make sweeping movements with my headlamp but it's soon clear that this one is a dead end.

"Metallic remains of the ammunition?" Abigail's voice suggests through the radio.

"Seems like it."

Then starts the interesting operation of backing out of the cave – it's too small for me to be able to turn around. I get out just as I start feeling a little claustrophobic.

"That wasn't fun," I mutter, and we move further down.

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The search is of course prolonged due to the breaks we take after every 30 minutes, and because we can't exceed the three hour diving time for each day. But three days and miles of canyon range behind us, we find the biggest cave yet. I move in, execute the usual search pattern... and freeze when the beam hits something not natural in its form. Square shapes. Covered in all sorts of garbage but definitely square.

"I'll be damned... would you look at that," I get out.

I swim closer, and count the shapes. There are at least five boxes, perfectly preserved despite their long submersion.

"Well, we found _something_," Abigail's deceptively calm voice says.

The mask prevents my grin showing when I turn to show thumbs up to Ian who has scrapped the security measures and followed me into the cave.

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Another day's work and we have the boxes up. We resisted temptation to open them before we had all on ground. They are housed in a sealed tent, to protect them from the elements and the air they have not been in touch with for decades.

My hands are shaking barely perceptibly when I reach to open the first box.

It's sealed well but after a brief struggle we have the lid open, and find out the insides are still dry. Then we are tearing through the protective padding.

"Amber," I say, looking at the contents, then, taking stock the amount and shape of the pieces my eyes shoot to meet Ian's gaze. "Amber!"

"Oh my God..." Abigail whispers.

"The Amber Room..." I say, not believing my eyes.

Ian is laughing.

I'm staring at him incredulously, and see Abigail doing the same.

"For c...c...centuries, your family has looked for _a_ t..tr...treasure," he tries to explain despite his hilarity, "and here you are, and in just a f...few years you have discovered the Templar treasure..." he uses his fingers to underline the count. "The Templar treasure, Atlantis, the Amber Room... what next? Should we move on to the missing Wonders of the World?"

I have to grin. "I'll settle for the stolen treasures of Atlantis."

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We do not find those, though, but something almost as precious. We find the lost paperwork about the expedition. From the clues to the planning and then the execution of the said plans. All of the names are codes, and even the correspondence about the ship is using pseudonyms.

We also find paperwork about other expeditions, other research the conspirators kept hidden from their leaders. Detailing trips to all corners of the globe... but none of the artefacts or notes collected during those journeys.

Then we find something concrete, a handwritten document, dated in the last days of the war. It is signed 'Wolf' and it seems like a part of a personal letter. Abigail translates it for us.

"_Concerning the artefacts recovered from the fabled A (?), hid them with the aid of Y.G. It will amuse You to find out that the clue to the location is present in the recent works of O.F. – presented by H.H. to the Führer himself, unaware of their true value._ There's a page missing... I think it had a map of the location, or other instructions."

"Well, the fabled 'A' is easy... And I suppose 'H.H.' will be Heinrich Himmler, then. But as to the rest..."

Ian looks amused and shakes his head. "I'll be damned," he says softly, then turns to look at me.

"I do believe I know the drawings he is talking about. They were stolen after Hitler's death and have changed hands many times since then..."

"How do you know about them?" I ask.

Ian merely smiles.

"Why don't you contact the kids and ask them to meet us in Grenoble."

"You mean this is enough to drag them from their Frozen Wonderland?" I ask, using Riley's favourite description of his new home.

"Oh, it's big enough, and trust me – Mina would not forgive us for leaving her out of this." He paused and his smile grows into a grin. "We're going treasure hunting."

- - - - -End of Part 2 - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


	3. Sing Some Other Golden Legend

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Part 3: Grenoble; "Sing Some Other Golden Legend"

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_three weeks later_

Hotel rooms are the same no matter the country, Riley thought, looking around yet another suite in yet another luxury hotel. Although, he had to admit, having roughed it in the field for as long as he had, he was ready to appreciate it a little more again.

And after 24 hours of travelling he was more than ready to appreciate a warm bed, right about now. Getting from Antarctica to France wasn't easy – even if you were a millionaire. From Antarctica to Southern Australia on a supply plane, from Southern Australia to Sydney, from Sydney to Paris – and even on first class that was gruelling – and from Paris to Grenoble, where Ben and Ian were waiting for them with a rental car. Half an hour and they were in the hotel, in the earth-coloured suite, saying hi to Abigail.

Riley had actually hugged Ben at the airport, so glad to see someone else besides their small group in the Frozen Wonderland. To Ian he had merely offered his hand to shake. His shameless wife had of course hugged and kissed both men.

She was looking even more tired than him, and Riley was actually a little worried. Mina was paler and tired more easily these days. And that made him feel protective.

"Look, guys, I'd love to catch up and hear why you wanted us here – not that I mind getting into civilisation a bit... but we really really need to sleep. And maybe get acquainted with that big big bath. But, you know, social stuff later?"

"Of course, you've had a long day – two days. Get some sleep. Call us when you wake up, no matter what time. You've flown through so many time zones it'll take a while for your bodies to readjust," Ben said, guiding Ian and Abigail towards the door.

"Yes, mom," Riley muttered but good-naturedly – he had, after all, missed him.

"Mmm, bed," he said after the others had left the room.

"Bed good." Mina giggled, and all but fell on it.

"'Bed good'? Okay, Ms Linguist, time to go beddy-bye."

"For once I won't fight you," she said, smiling at him from where she lay. "I've missed the others. It's not quite the same without them. Can't wait to hear what they've found out!"

"I can. At least until we get some sleep."

,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,

After 15 hours of sleep they felt a little dazed but otherwise better than they had. They woke up just in time for dinner which was served in Ben and Ian's suite – they did not want to talk in a public restaurant.

Riley looked ecstatic at the sight of real food.

"What?" he exclaimed when he felt people's eyes on him. "We don't exactly get gourmet food in Santa's summer house. And aeroplane food is aeroplane food even in the first class."

"Learned anything new?" Ben asked after a while of polite chatter.

"Yeah. Don't read Lovecraft if you live in a cave in Antarctica," Riley replied.

"I'll keep that in mind," Ian said dryly, then turned to look at Mina who was obviously dying to tell her news.

"We found some remains!" Mina said. "I've contacted some people to start working on them."

"Hey, Ben, what's the opposite of a perk?" Riley asked innocently. Mina naturally caught the reference, and hit him in the arm. The others didn't even raise an eyebrow.

"You, probably. Tell us, Mina," Ben prompted.

"We found mummified remains piled haphazardly in a room. Seemed like natural preservation more than anything. It looked like someone – maybe the Nazis – just took them from where ever they had been and dumped them out of their way. We didn't have proper professionals to work on them so we requested some experts. I am actually hoping to meet some of them during this journey."

"We'll see what we can do," Ben promised, then glanced at Ian. It was obvious they had something to tell. Riley knew they wouldn't have called them if it wasn't something big.

"We found what we were looking for," Ben explained, smiling, and Mina sat up straight, dropping her fork. Riley froze, his fork in air half way to his mouth.

"Lake Toplitz?" Mina asked, breathlessly.

"Yes. We found the crates our conspirators hid there in the last days of the war. Not the artefacts," he added hastily, although he had said as much in his e-mail that invited the others to Europe. "But something almost as good."

"The Amber Room," Ian said dryly.

Riley had no idea what he was talking about but Mina stared at him incredulously.

"Well, yes, that too," Ben said. "But what I meant was the documentation concerning the excursion to Antarctica. And a clue to the location of the, well, treasure."

"Sorry, Mario, but the princess is in another castle," Riley intoned, and Mina giggled.

Ben and Ian just stared at them.

"I think we're too old for them," Ian concluded.

"You must excuse my husband. Tell us."

Ben then produced a letter and went on to explain its contents.

"Wait, wait... if the actual bit with instructions is missing, couldn't someone have already recovered the stuff from wherever they were hidden?" Riley asked.

"That's the risk we have to take. And as to the clues... I have to admit, even I am in the dark but Ian has this knowing glint in his eyes. Ready to tell us why we are in Grenoble?"

"The names mentioned in the letter. I took a wild guess that 'Y.G.' was Yrjö von Grönhagen, and 'O.F.' Ola Forsell, members of an Ahnenarbe expedition to Finland and Karelia. You remember, one of those well documented expeditions of Himmler's?"

"Good work but that still doesn't explain..." Abigail started.

"I wouldn't have made the connection had the writer not mentioned a collection given to Hitler. It was bunch of drawings, from coastal Finland, not made during the first trip. Given to Hitler as a present by Himmler, stolen after his death, disappeared for a couple of years, reappeared a few years later, changed hands a couple of times, always outside the legal network. In the sixties the collection ended up in a museum somewhere in France but was stolen again a few years ago."

"Wow, how do you know these things?" Riley asked Ian. "I mean, is there a Bad Guy Weekly that keeps you updated?"

Mina looked at him, obviously shocked at his lack of tact but Ian seemed unruffled.

"Yeah. But I haven't paid the subscription for two years so they booted me off the fraternity," he replied seriously.

"You were telling us they were stolen...?" Abigail prompted.

"Yes. But I know where they are now," Ian answered, smiling.

"Of course you do," Riley said after a tiny pause.

"Do I really want to know?" Ben asked, but he was also smiling.

"Back in 1993 when they were stolen from the museum they ended up in the hands of a millionaire collector who shall remain nameless..."

"So we just go ask him to let us see it?" Riley interjected.

"He doesn't have them anymore." Ian was smiling widely.

"It was a brilliant job," he told them, still smiling. "I mean, it's not like the collector could inform the police that the drawings he wasn't supposed to have in the first place were stolen. And as I was the go-between..."

"Wait, you arranged the theft? From the museum?" Mina interrupted.

"I... negotiated the deal, yes. As I was saying... because I was his link to the criminal world I was the one he came to to find the culprits and punish them the extra-legal way... I found him a scapegoat who had conveniently been offed by someone else and with forged evidence he believed his treasure forever lost."

"So who has it?" Ben asked, smiling.

"Another rich collector?" Mina suggested.

"Points to the beautiful lady," Ian said, bowing his head a little.

"So, what, you just march in and ask to see some art he can't admit owning?" Riley said.

"Yes," Ian said, grinning unrepentantly. "Since he knows I can steal them from him if I want to, he'll be more than happy to help. If not, well... I designed his security system."

"That seems silly, if he knew you were a criminal who had betrayed your previous employer..." Abigail frowned.

"But he didn't. I was the head of his security, not a random criminal. I had held the position for years, even before the first theft. It was a very useful occupation."

"I love your brain," Riley said, fascinated.

"I've got dibs on his brain. And the other parts of him," Ben said, grinning.

"And that's why we're in Grenoble?" Abigail clarified.

"Yes. Monsieur F and his collection have just removed themselves from his summer house to his winter quarters here."

"How do you know that if they booted you of the fraternity?" Riley asked, almost seriously.

"What do you think? I read the news."

"Well excuse me, I'm a bit behind on news living in Antarctica!"

"Rubbish, you're on-line every day," Mina corrected.

"Well, not every day, the connection tends to be a bit dodgy. But, wow, the acoustics are great. I hooked up a decent audio system up into the first room we slept in, remember? Great sounds."

"Fascinating, I'm sure," Abigail said but she smiled so Riley took no offence.

"So, what, you go visit your shady past, then?" Riley asked Ian.

"Riley!" Mina admonished him again. "Behave."

"What? He was a criminal, it's not a big secret. He doesn't mind. Do you, Ian?"

"Well, _I_ mind, Mr Poole, and I'm the one you're married to!"

"Hey, cool down, babe..." Riley started, bemused at the show of temper. Mina wasn't usually the type to fly off the handle at small things.

Mina close her eyes and seemed to count to ten.

"I'm fine," she said, tersely.

"It's okay," Ian said, reaching for her hand. "I don't mind Riley's version of humour. After all, I _was_ a criminal."

"That's not the point," Mina replied, turning her hand to hold Ian's for a moment. "It's not nice."

"He's not a nice guy, haven't you learned that yet?" Ben interjected, obviously trying to defuse the mood.

"Hey! I'm nice. I rescue puppies and smile at children."

Mina smiled at that, and turned to face her husband. "Yes, but you smile creepily."

"I represent that statement," he fell back on the old joke, careful not to piss her off in her mood. PMS?

The rest of the meal went without an incident until Riley put his foot in his mouth again, with another dig at Ian's past.

"Would you just _stop_ needling Ian already? I know he doesn't mind but I do. I said I do, and expect you to take my wishes into account at least occasionally!" Mina said tetchily, and all but glowered at her husband.

"Whoa, protective much," Riley muttered. Which, on closer inspection, was not a good idea as Mina bolted up, and almost shouted his parting shot.

"Well, I'm sorry for caring about my friends!"

Following her burst, Mina ran from the room, and Riley stared after her, flabbergasted.

"What's up with her? I swear, she gets worse every day," he said, still not sure what had actually happened.

"Are you sure she's not pregnant?" Ian asked.

At Riley's pointed look he clarified: "That's how Joanna used to get during the first months."

"Joanna?"

"My wife."

Riley's first thought was that his jaw was probably hanging open. It wasn't. His second was the realisation Abigail's jaw was. His third thought was 'well, duh, he's almost fifty, he probably did have relationships before Ben', and the one he finally settled on was, 'at least Ben doesn't look surprised.'

"You have a child?" Abigail got out.

"No. They... died," Ian said simply, and as Ben reached out to hold his hand even Riley understood not to probe.

He got up instead, folding his napkin.

"Excuse me, I think I need to go check on Mina."

"Go ahead. We'll schedule a meeting with Ian's mysterious collector for tomorrow," Ben said.

"You could try chocolate," Abigail suggested.

Riley opened his mouth to say something sarcastic, then shut it, admitting that Abigail might actually have a point. After all, she had inside information.

"Uhh... any idea where I might find some at this hour?"

,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,

Riley found Mina crying softly in their room.

"I'm sorry," she said the same moment he said the exact same words.

They shared a small smile. Hers got wider when he warily offered her the box of chocolates he had been holding behind his back.

"I don't know what's got into me lately," she said, wiping her tears with a frustrated gesture. "Just... got a bit emotional seeing them after so long, or maybe it's being back in civilisation or something."

"Hormones," Riley teased softly, taking her into his arms, letting the box fall on the floor.

She faked a punch on his arm but let him hold her for a long time.

When they parted she picked up the chocolate.

"You're pretty smart, every now and then," she told him, attacking the insides hungrily.

Relieved that she hadn't taken the chocolate as an insult Riley merely smiled, selfishly taking credit for Abigail's idea. She was sure Abigail would understand. And it wasn't like he couldn't have thought of it on his own. Eventually.

"Did you know Ian was married?" Riley asked after a while, when her eating had slowed down.

"He's married?"

"No, I mean... he was. And they had a child. But they died. That's all I know," he hastened to say before she could get the questions out.

"No, I didn't. Can't blame him for not talking about it, though."

"Me neither. Come on, you need some more sleep."

"What about the drawings?" she asked even as she started moving towards the bed and removing her clothes.

"Tomorrow," Riley said absent-mindedly, eyes on her exposed skin.

Mina noticed his stare and smiled wickedly. "I thought you said sleep," she teased, purposefully slowing her movements.

He smirked, unbuttoning his own shirt.

"In time."

,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,

The visit to the white villa of 'Monsieur F' was almost anti-climactic. The old collector did not meet them but had arranged for his secretary to show them the drawings. The others didn't know what measures Ian had had to use to get them the permission and, quite frankly, didn't care.

There were seven drawings in all, originals in a display case and copies for them to study. Ian signed a document stating they would not publish the pictures or show them to anyone who could endanger their owner.

They didn't stay long, merely confirmed that the copies matched the originals in every detail. As they were leaving, Ian told the blank-faced secretary to tell his boss that 'they were even'. The man merely nodded in return and showed them out.

"Well, that was lots of fun," Riley said. "What happens now?"

"It's five o'clock," his wife replied. "Tea happens."

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The Americans declined the offer of tea and left to arrange for their journey to Finland, and to find an expert who could help them figure out the area the pictures depicted. Ian and Mina ordered the tea from room service and settled in the latter's room.

Mina was half way through her second cup before she could mention the subject she'd being dying to ask Ian about for two days.

"Riley told me about... your wife," she said, carefully, wary of his reaction.

He merely smiled a little sadly.

"Would you... tell me about it?"

"What do you want to know? I was young – we were both young, and... well, hardly a match made in Heaven."

"Why?" She frowned.

"I was the wrong side of everything, born on the wrong side of the blanket to the wrong side of the street," Ian listed. "Oh, and the wrong side of the law," he added, as an afterthought. "But her parents didn't know that."

"Did she?"

"Yes, Joanna knew everything."

"And she married you anyway. She must have loved you very much."

"Yes. Part of it was her desire to escape her stifling home life but she did truly love me. And she deserved better than what she got. I wasn't... because of where I grew up, I wasn't that good at talking about... my feelings. I've never been. Not until..."

"Ben," Mina supplied when he faltered.

Quick smile. "Yes, Ben."

They were quiet for a while, Mina basking in the feeling of closeness. She was sure he wouldn't have told that to just anyone.

"It's weird," she started, the stopped, fearing that saying it aloud would shatter the mood.

"What?"

"I just don't get it. I mean, I'd understand it if you looked like my father but..." she bit of the rest, blushing.

He got up from his chair to sit down next to her on the sofa.

"And you look nothing like me," he said, grinning. "But that doesn't stop me from feeling absurdly paternal."

She sighed. "Thank God, I thought I was making a fool of myself. I mean, you're a friend but..."

"I am. But Ben also teases me about adopting you ages ago."

"Riley says the same," Mina smiled. "Well, sort of."

"Well, that's settled then," he said, casually, and Mina could well see that he still wasn't too comfortable about all this emotional talk.

"What happened to Joanna?" she asked softly, taking his hand.

"She was seven months pregnant when the house we lived in burnt down. She... they didn't make it."

"I'm sorry," she said, squeezing his hand.

"She was only 21. I wasn't much older. My... our child would have been 27 this year," he finished quietly.

"I'll be 27 this December," Mina said softly.

This time there was no sadness in Ian's smile when he met her eyes.

,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,

After that they stayed on easier subjects, Mina telling about their discoveries in Atlantis and Ian about their adventures in Germany and Austria.

She was aware of a slight feeling of nausea even as they talked but as that was nothing unusual after a meal for her these days, she paid no attention to it until it got worse. And then much worse, and before she had time to apologise she had dashed to the nearest trash can and was throwing up the tea and toast.

When she was done, Ian was there, offering her paper towels and a glass of water wordlessly, then helped her to sit on the sofa while he got rid of the can.

"Are you all right?" he asked, sitting down next to her.

"Yes, I... I don't feel ill, really, just..." She shook her head.

"Mina... Are you pregnant?"

She looked at him as if he'd gone insane, then her eyes widened, and she took out her palmtop, checking the calendar.

"Bloody hell," she got out, and started smiling. "Some scientist I am. I can't even count."

He returned the smile.

"I... I need to buy a test. And tell Riley."

She was still pale but glowing.

"Why bother with a home test when we can probably get you a doctor's appointment immediately?"

"Oh, yeah... keep forgetting my changed circumstances," she said, grinning, and took his hand, squeezing hard.

"Happy?" he asked, pointlessly.

"Delirious. Though it will disturb my work. And I wonder what Riley will say. We haven't actually talked about children expect in a, you know, general, we'll-have-them-one-day way."

"I'm sure Riley will..."

"Riley will be very curious to hear why you're sitting here holding his wife's hand."

Riley had walked in just as Ian had started his sentence and they both turned to look at him.

"Mina! Are you okay?" he exclaimed as soon as he saw her face.

"Just felt a little faint, and had another bonding moment with my fellow Brit," she replied, smiling, and let go of Ian's hand to get up to hug Riley.

"How did it go?" she asked.

"Fine, fine. What's wrong? You over-exerted yourself again?"

"I'll... leave you to it. You know where we are if you need anything, kiddo," Ian reminded Mina, and after a moment's hesitation kissed her on the cheek before exiting the room.

"What was all that?" Riley asked, more confused than jealous. After all, it was pretty obvious Ian's feelings were paternal more than anything else.

"I think you'd better sit down," Mina suggested, smiling.

,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,.,

"Pregnant?" Riley repeated for what must have been twelfth time.

Mina bit her lip, suddenly uncertain of his feelings about the matter. Then he got down on his knees, and hugged her middle.

"For real?" he asked, eyes suspiciously shiny.

She just nodded, holding her breath.

"I'm gonna be a dad," he said, wonderingly, and Mina smiled.

"You'll be a great dad," she said, petting his hair.

"And you'll be an absent-minded mom, but we'll deal," he teased lightly. "And at least the kid will have very rich godparents."

"Godparents? You do remember I don't belong to a church, Riles?"

"Yeah, well I don't care about the 'God' part of it but... I want to ask Ben. He's my best friend. Well, besides you."

"What if I want to ask Ian?" she asked

"I thought you were casting him into the role of a grandfather," Riley teased.

"I've always felt close to him. Maybe it's just because we are both Brits among you Americans but I..."

"Hey, no need to get defensive, babe. I get it, I do. I... It took me some time to get over all that trying to kill us thing but... I think Anne helped me put it all in perspective. I don't mind having Ian as part of my family. And now that I've said that it sounds so weird I think I need a kiss."

- - - end of Part 3 - - -


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